August 31, 2018 –The Festival of Words celebrates another year with three amazing authors and two days of memorable events!  The festival will take place Friday and Saturday, November 2 and 3 in Grand Coteau.  This year includes nationally recognized authors: Poet Laureate Jack Bedell, Poet & songwriter Cornelius Eady and Rough Magic and Ladee Hubbard, author of The Talented Ribkins.  Festival events include: creative writing workshops in community centers and public schools, a community stage for open mics, “Drive-by Poetry” in grocery stores, boutiques and restaurants–and many opportunities for people to interact with featured authors.

The Friday night event takes place at Chicory’s Café in Grand Coteau featuring poetry by Jack Bedell, a poetry/music performance by Cornelius Eady & Rough Magic with special guest D’Jalma Garnier; and a reading by Ladee Hubbard from her award-winning novel. On Saturday, Drive-by Poetry performers will recite poems in Grand Coteau and Sunset businesses.   Meanwhile, at the Thensted Center there will be an open mic and multiple creative writing workshops, which are open to the public, as well as a blackpot cook off.

For more information, check out festivalofwords.org or contact Martha Garner at (337) 804-2482 or  fowmartha@gmail.com.

AUTHORS 

Jack Bedell is currently serving as the Poet Laureate of Louisiana. Dr. Bedell is a Professor of English at Southeastern Louisiana University and the author of nine books, including Call and Response (with Darrell Bourque, 2010), Come Rain, Come Shine (2006), What Passes for Love (2001), Bone-Hollow, True: New & Selected Poems (2013), Elliptic (2016), and Revenant (2016). As editor of Southeastern’s literary magazine Louisiana Literature since 1992, he has published numerous Louisiana poets. Dr. Bedell has taught creative writing to students of all ages, from the third-grade level to the graduate level over the last 30 years. Intimate and personable, his work reflects a familiarity with Louisiana life and its people. In addition, he has worked with the LEH’s award-winning PRIME TIME Family Literacy Program as a storyteller and continues to promote the writing of his fellow Louisianans.

“Jack Bedell’s love for Louisiana is evident in his work, and I’m confident that he will serve honorably as the state’s poet laureate,” said Gov. John Bel Edwards. “I want to thank the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities for leading this search, and I congratulate all of the nominees whose writings capture the heart of the people and places that make our state a unique and wonderful place to call home.”

Cornelius Eady was born in 1954 in Rochester, New York. He is the author of several books of poetry, including the critically acclaimed Hardheaded Weather (Penguin, 2008), which was nominated for an NAACP Image Award. His other titles are Kartunes (Warthog Press, 1980); Victims of the Latest Dance Craze (Ommation Press, 1986), winner of the 1985 Lamont Prize from the Academy of American Poets; The Gathering of My Name (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 1991), nominated for the 1992 Pulitzer Prize in Poetry; You Don’t Miss Your Water (Henry Holt and Co., 1995); The Autobiography of a Jukebox (Carnegie-Mellon University Press, 1997); Brutal Imagination (Putnam, 2001); the mixed media book/cds Book of Hooks (Kattywompus Press, 2013) and Singing While Black (Kattywompus Press, 2015). His work appears in many journals, magazines, and the anthologies Every Shut Eye Ain’t Asleep, In Search of Color Everywhere, and The Vintage Anthology of African American Poetry, (1750-2000) ed. Michael S. Harper.

With poet Toi Derricote, Eady is cofounder of Cave Canem, a national organization for African American poetry and poets. He is the recipient of an NEA Fellowship in Literature (1985); a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship in Poetry, (1993); a Lila Wallace-Readers Digest Traveling Scholarship to Tougaloo College in Mississippi (1992-1993); a Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship to Bellagio, Italy, (1993); and The Prairie Schooner Strousse Award (1994).Eady has taught poetry at SUNY Stony Brook, where he directed its Poetry Center; City College; Sarah Lawrence College; New York University; The Writer’s Voice; The 92nd St Y; The College of William and Mary; Sweet Briar College; and The University of Missouri-Columbia. He a professor in the MFA program at SUNY Stony Brook Southampton.

In most of Eady’s poems, there is a musical quality drawn from the Blues and Jazz. Indeed, many of his poem titles allude to traditional African-American hymns and modern musicians such as Thelonius Monk and Miles Davis. Eady is also available to perform with his literary band, Rough Magic. Rough Magic is a New York-based band sprung from Almost by “magic,” a group of poet-musician-composers have converged who share Eady’s vision that text, melody, harmony, and rhythm all have an equally strong place in artistic expression. Rough Magic calls upon troubadour traditions and evokes the sounds and storytelling of blues greats like Muddy Waters, folk legends such as Woody Guthrie and the unexpected grooves and subject-matters of the Talking Heads. At the same time, band members hold a keen sense of innovation, as they are all working text-and-music makers engaged in building new combinations of words and sounds.

Ladee Hubbard was born in Massachusetts, raised in Florida and the U.S. Virgin Islands and currently lives in New Orleans with her husband and three children. She received a B.A. from Princeton University, a Ph.D. from the University of California-Los Angeles, and an M.F.A. in creative writing from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She has published short fiction in the Beloit Fiction Journal and Crab Orchard Review among other publications and has received fellowships from the Hambidge Center, the Virginia Center for Creative Arts and the Hurston/Wright Foundation. She is a recipient of a 2016 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writer’s Award. THE TALENTED RIBKINS is the debut novel by Ladee Hubbard, a fresh and exciting new voice in literary fiction. Inspired by W.E.B. Du Bois’ famous essay, this marvelously inventive novel tells the story of Johnny Ribkins, a 72-year old African-American antiques dealer from Florida who was born with a unique talent: he can make perfect maps of any space he walks through.

Key of “C” Accordion Kiosk

The St. Landry Parish Tourist Commission (SLPTC) has installed a new art piece, the Key of “C” Accordion Kiosk. The kiosk is a unique concept that combines art, construction, design, and modern technology. The sculpture allows the user to explore CajunTravel.com, a website designed to promote travel to St. Landry Parish, Louisiana and assist visitors with travel decisions.

The accordion is mobile, using a pulley system, and can be adjusted to the user’s height, making it accessible to children and those with disabilities. One of the most exciting features is the accordion’s functionality. This piece was designed to resemble a single row diatonic accordion, one of the earliest accordions used in Acadiana. It is sometimes referred to as a “Cajun Accordion” but was widely popular in the Creole community as well. We can thank early German settlers for bringing us this well-loved musical instrument and thus shaping our heritage and music. Traditionally the diatonic accordion has a button keyboard on the right-hand side with 10 buttons. On the Key of “C” Accordion, six of these buttons are functioning and play a variety of genres found in this region of the state including Lala, Creole, Zydeco, Traditional Cajun, and Progressive Cajun.

Key of “C” Accordion Song List

Les Blues de Voyages by Amédé Ardoin (La la)
Bon soir Moreau by Geno Delafose & French Rockin’ Boogie (Creole)
Tighten Up Zydeco by Clifton Chenier & The Louisiana Ramblers (Zydeco)
Ma Valse Favori by Cleoma Falcon (Traditional Cajun)
Kara’s Bounce by T’Monde (Contemporary Cajun)
Blues de Bernadette by Lost Bayou Ramblers (Progressive Cajun)

The sculpture was designed and created by Breaux Bridge artist, Kelly Guidry. Teamwork Solutions of Lafayette facilitated the project and handled the digital components of the kiosk. Widely known throughout Louisiana as the “Chainsaw Guy,” Kelly uses wood and metal to bring to life imaginative figures. For the Key of “C” accordion, Kelly used multi-use, reclaimed wood, some pieces nearly 200 years old, and custom-made decorative brackets. Materials include antique pine, pecky cypress, and even bousillage support columns for the top of the structure. Any new materials were dramatically distressed. Casey Deshotel, President & CEO of Teamwork Solutions was responsible for the digital kiosk and the musical element.

Why the key of “C”? You might be wondering, “What’s in the name?” You could interpret “C” as either Cajun or Creole. Both would be accurate as the accordion is a popular instrument among both communities and in a very wide variety of musical genres, but the name has more to do with the history of the accordion rather than cultural ownership.

According to Ann Savoy’s book, “Cajun Music A Reflection of a People Volume I,” early accordions were only made available in the keys of “A” and “F.” This made it difficult for fiddlers who couldn’t tune their instrument to those keys. It wasn’t until companies like Monarch and Sterling released “C” and “D” accordions that it became a popular accompaniment to the fiddle at a house dance or “la la.” Ann also notes in her book that the “C” accordion was preferred by musicians. What would Louisiana music be like without this instrument? Who would our icons be if Amédé Ardoin or Iry Lejeune wouldn’t have picked up the accordion? Did the key of “C” change the future of our music? That’s just some food for thought!

The Key of “C” Accordion Kiosk is supported by a grant from the Louisiana Division of the Arts, Office of Cultural Development, Department of Culture Recreation and Tourism in cooperation with the Louisiana State Arts Council as administered by the Acadiana Center for the Arts.